Posted on 07/11/2021 8:58:07 AM PDT by blam
UK media on Friday revealed another major military close encounter with a Russian vessel following the June 23 Black Sea warning shot incident – but this time in the Mediterranean where a Russian submarine was said to be “stalking” the Royal Navy’s Carrier Strike Group in the waters.
The Telegraph on Friday broke the following based on defense sources:
A Russian submarine stalked the Royal Navy’s Carrier Strike Group (CSG) prompting a helicopter hunt for the vessel, The Telegraph can reveal.
Merlin helicopters were scrambled to search for the Russian submarine when the group was passing through the eastern Mediterranean.
HMS Queen Elizabeth, Wikimedia Commons
The Royal Navy sub-hunting helicopters as part of their search and identification efforts dropped sonobuoys, specially designed listening and monitoring devices sunk beneath the water which can pick up submarine movements.
The report doesn’t identify which specific Russian sub the UK military was on the lookout for, only that it was likely a diesel-electric Kilo-Class submarine from the Black Sea fleet. It was further suggested there was high confidence it was trailing British vessels within the days after the prior Black Sea incident. The sub was said to be stalking the HMS Queen Elizabeth and accompanying strike group vessels.
“The hunt for the submarine took place four days after the confrontation in the Black Sea between HMS Defender, a Type-45 air defence ship, and Russian forces” – The Telegraph report indicates, however, the information is only just now being revealed at the end of this week.
Merlin sub-hunting helicopter, Royal Navy file image
For years Russia’s navy and aerial forces have had a significant presence in the eastern Mediterranean, especially off Syria’s coast where the Russian naval base at Tartus is located.
More details on the Royal Navy’s scrambling a response effort from The Telegraph report are as follows:
There are seven such helicopters deployed with the group, and these would likely have been operating in coordination with other anti-submarine assets. These include the two Type-23 frigates HMS Kent and HMS Richmond and the Royal Navy’s deployed hunter-killer submarine, thought to be HMS Astute or HMS Ambush.
While the MoD refused to confirm the incident, understood to have occurred on June 27, it said “robust measures” were in place to protect the CSG, which is on its first operational deployment.
Source: The Telegraph
HMS Queen Elizabeth and its escort ships are now out of Mediterranean waters after traversing the Suez Canal, and about to enter the Indian Ocean as part of an eight month deployment.
Currently, NATO and allied vessels continue a heavy presence in the Black Sea, especially given the ongoing Sea Breeze 2021 exercises, which involve Ukraine’s military participation as well. This sets the stage for potentially more dangerous close encounters with Russia’s military, which has warned it will fire upon any vessel breaching its territorial waters.
The Russians are coming and once the armada reaches the Indo-Pacific the Chinese will be coming.
Stay tuned to the Bat Channel.
“UK Scrambled Sub-Hunting Aircraft,” implying a sense of urgency if not outright panic, or “UK Launches Sub-Hunting Aircraft,” implying capitalizing on an opportunity to locate and track a true adversarial target, and gather sound signature intelligence?
Methinks the latter.
Its a brave submarine crew that tries to take on the Royal Navy. The RN is probably unmatched by any navy in the world when it comes to anti-submarine warfare, a legacy of the struggles with German U-Boats and a decision to specialise in this role as part of the UK’s naval contribution to NATO.
Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the Royal Navy’s anti-surface capabilities which are pretty crap and are largely dependent on an handful of SSN’s which whilst extremely capable are few in number and dangerously inflexible when it comes to being able to engage surface threats form a safe distance.
Yup.
You couldn't have paid the Russians to provide such intimate exposure and 'training.'
(Old sub sailor SS-368)
Gotta love the Brits. Build an aircraft carrier when they have no fixed wing naval air forces at all. The USMC had to embark to be the air wing.
So our guys have to serve under a Brit.
The French built a carrier and found out only after it was built that the deck was to short for their carrier aircraft.
"Charles de Gaulle entered sea trials in 1999. These identified the need to extend the flight deck to safely operate the E-2C Hawkeye.[14] This operation sparked negative publicity, however, as the same tests had been conducted on both Foch and Clemenceau when the F-8E (FN) Crusader fighter had been introduced. The 5 million francs for the extension was 0.025% of the total budget for the Charles de Gaulle project. On 28 February 2000, a nuclear reactor trial triggered the combustion of additional isolation elements, producing a smoke incident.[citation needed] "
That one photo, is almost 25% of the Royal Navy and includes it’s only carrier. (A carrier that uses borrowed planes)
The Indian Navy is more powerful, and the Japanese Navy utterly outclasses them.
The Royal Navy is a sad shadow of it’s past. The Falklands would be impossible for them today.
Nice catch.
> Currently, NATO and allied vessels continue a heavy presence in the Black Sea... <
Stupid, unless you actually want to provoke an incident with Russia.
As a side note, I wonder how the UK would have felt if the Soviet Union had sent warships into the Irish Sea during The Troubles (the Northern Ireland conflict).
They're supporting Islamist immigrants instead.
Yeah, that was a screw up on the Charles De Gualle, but the fix was cheap. Much cheaper than our EMALS fiasco. And the QE running on Windows XP and Windows 7.
At least the French Carrier has a useful mix and includes some hot fixed wing catapult Rafaels and patrol planes, and Greyhounds can use it. (if there are any left these days)
Weird that the Brits spent that much money and effort on a carrier that dooms them to nothing but jump jets and no other fixed wing. They used to be really good.
It’s sad when you have a passing familiarity with what the Royal Navy once was, and what it was until fairly recently.
The rampant socialism of the home country was the ultimately the thing that defeated them.
The UK Navy is no bigger than a small USN Fleet Task Force.
Yes. Opportunity for a good training exercise.
Cool. Dead Russians are good Russians.
Is Zubu your blog?
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